


Danse Macabre

by CrazyCatMeow



Series: The Meteor Effect [28]
Category: Hermitcraft
Genre: Blood, Chickens were harmed, Gen, Hurt/Comfort, Joe has glasses, Lore - Freeform, Pointed ears, Poultry man would be disappointed, fangs, lion cub, red eyes, vampire
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-24
Updated: 2021-01-16
Packaged: 2021-03-11 05:01:12
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 8,196
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28299369
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/CrazyCatMeow/pseuds/CrazyCatMeow
Summary: After Joe talks to the meteor, his mouth starts to hurt and he grows fangs. Unfortunately fangs don’t tell much about what the transformation is.
Relationships: n/a
Series: The Meteor Effect [28]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1529078
Comments: 100
Kudos: 113





	1. Sapping Sting

**Author's Note:**

> TW
> 
> Blood

Seeing Joe fall to the ground Doc carefully helps him up to his feet. “What happened in there?”

Joe shakes his head, “I was asking Avar why he’s doing this to us…”

Doc frowns softly, “What did he say?”

Swallowing hard Joe looks up, ”He said he wants to destroy the Vex. They are the reason he’s like this. Doc, he’s hurting… I don’t know how I should feel.”

“You talked with him, I think the fact he let you says something about him. He’s a horrible person for doing this to us but, I trust you.”

Joe‘s face falls as he unconsciously licks his teeth, “I think he’s a lonely, broken man who is lost in his want for justice. He thinks he's unredeemable.”

Frowning Doc glances over at the dark screen in the corner of the room. Standing up he hisses quietly in the back of his throat, “And how do you feel?”

“I-I think something might be happening,” Joe looks up at Doc, his glasses knocked partly to the side, “My mouth has been feeling a little weird, it’s gotten worse as we’ve been talking.”

Walking over Doc silently opens Joe’s mouth, “Yeah you’ve got fangs budding.”

Pulling away from the creeper, Joe puts his head down on the table, “Unfortunately, I assume that this will tell us nothing about what’s happening.”

Doc nods, “Fangs don’t work as a good tell, it’s too common of a thing…”

Joe cracks a small sad smile, “That's a sentence I never thought I would hear.”

Snorting Doc rolls his eyes, “What has our life become, man… seriously though does anything else feel weird?”

“I don’t know, I might be in shock but everything is sorta… overwhelming.”

“I’ll ask again later,” Doc smiles.

“Unless you need something could I go to my base?”

“Yeah, that’s fine,” Doc murmurs, “Are you tired?”

Joe nods, “The transformations drain some energy don’t they?”

Doc squints, “Sometimes, normally it’s during really extreme transformations.”

Pulling his communicator out Joe inspects his newly formed fangs. They’ve stopped growing by this point and they are sharp. Poking over his lips they glint softly. Carefully he tucks his fangs into his mouth for a moment, before deciding that it’s a lot more comfortable to let them poke out just a little.

As they start making their way to the winery Joe squints in the bright sunlight, “So what do you think will happen?” His fangs causing him to lisp heavily.

“I’m not sure,” Doc mutters, “Could be anything, all we know is fangs, something with your ears and it looks like you're at least a little bit nocturnal…”

“That’s a bit concerning and why do you say nocturnal?”

Doc shrugs, “You look like it’s a bit bright even though we’re flying with the sun behind us.”

Joe frowns, as he pokes at his fangs for a moment, “Ok, that’s weird.”

Landing in the grass surrounding Joe’s base, Doc laughs, “It’ll get worse.”

Frowning Joe shakes his head, and yawns. He waves to Doc as he enters his base, they agree to meet up in the morning. Stumbling into his bedroom he collapses into his bed. 

Rubbing his lip he winces as his finger is cut by the fangs. The irony smell of the blood smells different than normal. Licking the blood off he waits for the small cut to stop bleeding before falling asleep.

A few days pass and nothing else has happened, he still has his fangs. Doc hasn’t been able to figure out what’s happening and for some reason Joe has been exhausted; sleeping well into the day at times.

Doc has been relentlessly attempting to find what animals teeth match Joe’s fangs. He’s even gone off world to see if the watchers know anything, they did not.

Slowly Joe learns how to speak with his fangs, at times his voice is still a bit lost with lisps but he’s learning. The fangs are still sensitive so sometimes they hurt when he bites down. Eating is a completely different problem that ends in a mess more often than not. The length of the fangs makes chewing food pretty difficult. 

Snagging an apple from his countertop Joe bites in and freezes. Instead of protesting the sudden contact his fangs don’t hurt, in fact something seems to click. Instead of taking a bite he drinks the juice that drips from the apple. It’s almost like his brain has fuzzed out slightly. Nearby a chicken clucks and suddenly everything is in perfect clarity. 

Silently Joe stalks outside and grabs the chicken. Darting back inside he shakes his head and looks at the chicken confused. As he sits and stares at the chicken everything goes dark. 

Doc slowly walks up the path to Joe’s winery, everything is deathly still. Nothing dares to move or make a sound. 

Pushing the door open Doc stumbles back. Blood is splattered across the wine vats, and Joe is lying unconscious nearby. 

After a heart stopping moment Doc realizes that it’s not Joe’s blood and a chicken is laying dead on the floor nearby. Carefully with his metallic arm Doc brings the chicken outside and buries it. Kneeling next to Joe, Doc gags slightly at the amount of blood smeared across his face.

Pulling out his communicator Doc calls Xisuma, “Hey, uh I think I know what’s happened to Joe… he’s a vampire.”

Xisuma gasps softly, “Is he ok?”

“I think so, he’s drained a chicken and made a mess.”

“Bring him over to Bdubs village, I’ll clean his house, you get him cleaned up.”

“Gotcha,” Doc hangs up and picks Joe up carefully. As he walks out towards Bdubs, Doc realizes what’s been off the entire time, it’s been overcast and gray this entire time that Joe’s been affected. Once out of Joe’s ’territory‘ the weather returns to normal. Shaking the sense of foreboding off Doc does his best to get the poet cleaned off.

Once all the blood is washed of his skin, Doc brings him over to one of the homes. Xisuma walks over a few minutes later.

“It’s so obvious,” Doc groans.

“Well, now it it’s, before we just knew that his senses were all messed up and he had fangs.”

“So, uh what now?”

Xisuma shrugs, “We should probably get some more animals over here for him then see if he needs, uh player blood.”

Doc frowns as he sets the poet on a bed. He hasn’t stirred this entire time. Walking over to the castle where Bdubs is working he explains what happened. As he walks back to the house where Joe is, he pauses, this all seems vaguely familiar.

“Howdy Xisuma,” Joe grins as he sits up, “Oh, uh what happened?”

Xisuma’s spines bristle as he sits next to Joe, “Good news and bad news. We know what you are and it’s a vampire.”

Gasping he tucks his fangs inside his mouth and blinks down at his hands, “What happened?”

“Well, you killed a chicken and drank its blood, I’m not entirely sure what else.”

The doors swing open, “You splattered blood everywhere and your base is your territory.”

Deciding to focus on one thing at a time Joe asks, “Territory?”

“Well, you have that vampire game and from what you’ve told me your transformation matches a lot with that vampire. The territory from what I can remember is all dark and foreboding, if you look there’s mist surrounding your winery.”

“Are there ravens?”

“There are ravens, but I don’t think that’s much of a tell since they like your berry fields.”

Joe grins and flashes his fangs before letting them poke out again, “So if we’re following the game’s rules… something bad is going to happen. I can tell.”

Xisuma stands up, “What’s happening?”

“Undead, vampires are undead,” Doc gasps.

Joe nods, “I don’t know if I’ll have to…” He pauses and takes a deep breath, “I don’t know.”

Doc hisses softly, “I know what I’m looking for now so we should be able to find stuff.”

Nodding Joe starts to wiggle out of the blankets, “Can I get back to my winery? I need to think.”

“Of course,” Xisuma smiles softly under his helmet.

Joe flies back to his base and calls Cleo telling her to come over.

By the time she arrives he’s been pacing back-and-forth for a few minutes, she’s about to greet him in her normal way when she spots the distressed look in his eyes, “Ok, what happened.”

“Ahh yes, Cleo of the zombies. I uh, I might be a vampire and I am very confused.”

“I see, I can hear your heart beating, so that’s a problem.”

Nodding Joe slumps down in a chair, “I don’t think Xisuma or Doc would take it well if I told them I would need to die. There’s a few things that I need to do first…”

“This involves a coffin, doesn’t it?” Cleo asks, rolling her eyes.

“Yep,” Joe says, pulling out a large purple book, “I told you I was talking to the meteor, I forgot about this until now but there was something that relates to the transformations. There was a plush guardian, a gear, feathers, and there was this book.”

“So, the ‘I’m so scary Mr. Meteor’ has the same reading taster that you do…” Joe flips the book over showing Cleo the name, “It’s a vampire book,” Cleo slaps her forehead.

“Since the meteor was putting this book back on the shelf when I got there, I think this can tell us what we should expect.”

“Wow, ok. That’s actually really smart,” Cleo grins, “I feel like this won’t end well.”

“Oh, it definitely won’t,” Joe frowns as he opens the book the the coffin pages, “So uh, I won’t sleep in that-“

Cleo cackles for a moment before composing herself, “Continue.”

“Anyways, uh, we probably just need to make a bed with a lid…”

“Well, its says here that, it needs to let mist in and out.”

“Ok, it’ll have a slot,” Joe explains as he doodles a crude mock up. He stands up and heads deeper into his base.

As Joe looks for wood in his storage room Cleo plucks the book up and reads some of the text on the page, “The coffin is where vampires rest and reform when they're defeated. They are usually hidden away in areas that are difficult to access by non-vampires and are heavily protected. The coffin has an opening to allow mist to enter and exit.”

Shrugging at the book Cleo agrees and the pair get to work, “So Joe, how does blood taste?”

“Well, I wasn’t really conscious for most of that, but it’s weird. It has a different level to the flavor.”

“You know when I died I thought that same thing. Blood just tastes weird. Of course I just use cloned flesh.”

Joe nods softly before quietly asking, “This might be an awkward question, but with demise what did feel like when you died?”

Instantly Cleo becomes more serious, “Oh no, Joe,” She lets out a soft sigh, “It’ll be really off putting at first. Since magic will power all the systems in your body it’s completely silent. No heartbeat, no breathing. Well to talk you still have to breathe… anyway you’ll be ok.”

Smiling in thanks Joe flops down on his bed, Cleo calmly shuts the lid. A few moments later Joe pushes it open and grins, “This is really weird.”

“Let me guess that felt right?”

Joe nods, “Ok, I think it’s time.”

Cleo grins and pulls out her sword, “We should probably do this outside.”

Swallowing hard Joe follows Cleo outside, “Ok, do it.”

JoeHillsSays was slain by ZombieCleo

DocM77: What?

ZombieCleo: he’s a vampire, he’s supposed to be undead. Being alive is going to cause problems.

Xisuma: you should have warned us

ZombieCleo: sorry

ZombieCleo: well, uh I think that worked.

ZombieCleo: his corpse turned into mist and has settled in his coffin.

Grian: you made a coffin?

ZombieCleo: yes

The entire server holds their breath, while respawn isn’t horrible it’s still unpleasant. If it’s unexpected it can take about half an hour to wake up. On the occasions that it’s expected it’s already been prepared so it’ll only take a few moments to regain balance and your bearings. 

It’s been a little over an hour and Joe has yet to emerge.

“We should check on him,” Doc murmurs.

“Don’t open it,” Cleo explains, “That could perma kill him.”

Doc quickly draws back and looks scared, “X, you might want to lock his bed from getting broken.”

The admin nods, “Already doing it.”

“Joe said he doesn’t want an actual coffin, but he might change his mind. He looked very happy just with this,” Cleo grins as Exy walks in the room.

Xisuma rolls his eyes, “If you do get a coffin please make sure you get it from one of the, ‘do you want to attend your own funeral?’ places and not a serious place.”

Nodding Cleo gasps, “I would never disrespect the dead.”

Raising an eyebrow Xisuma points at Joe’s bed box.

“It’s Joe, it’s my job to mess with him.” 

Cleo and Exy head off world and come back an hour and a half later with a coffin.

Xisuma fondly rolls his eyes, “Ok, so he should wake up in about thirty minutes.”

Doc nods as he grudgingly helps Cleo and Exy set the very over dramatic vampiric coffin down in a corner. 

The air is completely still as everyone waits in silence for Joe to awake. It’s never taken this long for someone to respawn. The fog around his base seems to get heavier, it still has a forbording aura but nothing seems to change. Until a harsh cough draws their attention.

“Joe? Are you ok?”

“I-I can’t…” Joe stamers as he attempts to stand up.

Cleo stands up, “He can’t feel his heart.”

Eyes wide Joe nods as he puts his hand against his wrists, “It’s ok, I think I’ll be ok.”

At Xisuma’s panicked glance, Cleo looks over and explains, “Having a heart beat is always in the background, you don’t know what you have until it’s gone.”

“Joe I don’t want to make you panic but you should look at your hands,” Doc says slowly.

Gasping Joe looks at his fingers. The nails have hardened and formed into sharp claws. Wincing as he looks at his reflection he swallows hard. His ears have elongated into sharp points and his eyes have flecks of red in the iris. Taking a short breath in he frowns, “That’s interesting.”


	2. Life Transference

It’s been a few days since Joe’s ‘death’ and the newly formed vampire has gotten pretty used to his fangs and other new additions. His lack of a heartbeat doesn’t bother him as much as he'd expected. Much of his time is spent poring over the book on vampires. Nothing else has happened yet but Avar is still active so Who knows what will happen. 

“Ok, Joe we've got a test for you,” Xisuma explains as he sets several blood-filled shot glasses down, “Can you sit down for me?”

Joe swallows before sitting down.

“Thanks, so each of the shot glasses has a different mob blood. Chicken, pig, cow, and sheep. I want you to drink them all one at a time and rank them.”

Nodding Joe grins, “It’s like a wine testing?”

“Sure,” Xisuma grins, “Do you want some crackers and cheese?”

Bursting out in laughter Joe nods, “Let’s do this as normal as possible.” 

Xisuma agrees as he slides a pen and paper over to Joe, “Will do, I'll be back in a moment.”

Softly Joe nods as he picks up one of the glasses. Looking down at the paper he spots the numbered list, looking back at the shot glasses he rolls his eyes softly. They’ve been numbered.

Smiling softly Joe picks up the first glass and takes a sip. Compared to the chicken blood he’s been drinking it’s almost bitter… it’s not bad but sour. Licking his fangs clean Joe writes a 4/10 in the notebook.

Moving on he picks up the second glass. This time he blinks as he swallows, “That was good,” he murmurs. The taste is sweeter and good. It’s really good, he gives it a mark of 7/10. Drinking the rest of the glass Joe smiles.

The next glass has the ever-familiar chicken blood. This one just has a mild iron flavor without much else added. It tastes familiar by this point so he really can pin flavors. It’s given a 6/10 on his scale.

Before he can taste the final glass Xisuma comes back in with something that smells delicious. Taking a small sip from his glass his eyes widen softly. Placing the glass down he scribbles down his verdict 8/10.

“Xisuma?” Joe hisses, “What is that?”

“Well, uh it’s human blood,” Xisuma states, “I know you don’t really want to drink from people but you need to…”

Joe sighs and takes the lid off the cup, as the scent fills the room his eyes widen. Subconsciously licking his fangs, Joe takes the cup and drinks some. He freezes, “That’s so good,” He murmurs softly while taking a long drink. 

Squinting Xisuma looks at his face, “Joe, you look a lot healthier.”

“What do you mean?” 

“Your cheeks have some color to them,” Xisuma explains as Joe dumps all the remaining blood into the same cup and drinks it.

“I feel a lot better now… How’s this I drink a cup of human blood a week.”

“You seemed to like it?” Xisuma asks, his tail flicking back.

“That’s the problem. I like it too much,” Joe explains.

Xisuma reaches over and picks the list up, “That is a problem, I’d say stick to chicken and pig blood.”

Nodding Joe agrees it wouldn’t be nice if he drank cow or sheep blood with Zedaph and Beef being skittish around things. A vampire would definitely terrify them, “Whose blood did you give me?”

“Stress, she felt a bit guilty that she couldn’t help with the last few transformations.”

Joe nods as he stands from the table and walks to the sink. As Xisuma watches he looks at him before realizing. He’s been holding himself differently then normal, normally Joe walks quickly with small steps. Now his steps look more planned and graceful even.

“X, you still here?” Joe asks, snapping Xisuma out of his thoughts.

“Oh, sorry I was thinking…”

“This whole thing is pretty messed up,” Joe frowns, “Everything feels wrong, even my movement.”

“Well, that might be because you’re walking differently. It’s less rushed and more graceful.”

“Oh, well that is an answer to a question I didn’t know I had.”

Xisuma grins, “So does anything else feel weird?”

“I don’t know, but I feel like I’m getting more and more vampire-like every day.”

If something happens, tell me immediately,” Xisuma instructs as his tail flicks.

Joe nods, “Of course.”

It’s a few days later when Joe stumbles across another problem. He’s on his way to visit Stress, stopping by to bring her some sweet berries. 

As he nears her base there’s an unfamiliar sense of foreboding. Something nagging at him that something’s wrong. Stopping at the edge of her base he steps forward and hits a wall.

Placing his hands against the air Joe frowns. He had expected something like this but didn’t think it would be this bad.

Vampires are unable to enter someone’s home without permission. When the person’s home is constructed from multiple buildings it seems that a barrier forms.

Pulling out his communicator Joe sends a quick message to Xisuma before sending a message to the world chat.

JoeHillsays: It appears that in my current state of being a vampire I need permission to visit your bases. 

ZombieCleo: ran into some problems I see

JoeHillsays: quite literally.

Grian: rip, you’re welcome in my base

Iskall85: same dude, you’re welcome in my base anytime.

The others all send messages saying similar things letting him walk freely around the server once more.

As he sets the shulker full of berries down in Stress’s base he grins. Small footsteps from behind draw his attention.

“Oh, hi Max,” Joe says as the small dragon hops up on a branch.

“Hello,” Max chirps, “I’ve got a few questions for you.”

Joe makes a small oh, “Why don’t we head somewhere a bit more suitable for a talk.”

Max nods, “That works,” he hops up onto Joe’s shoulders and watches as he walks into the nether and back to his base.

“So, uh, what do you want to know?”

“It’s to do with Avar, he turned you into a vampire to start fights,” He flicks his tail as he sits on the table, “The problem with that is, well vampires aren’t a problem in your world. Avar might start making things worse and worse for you.”

Joe nods, “I think I understand, the more we keep rolling with his punches the more he gets annoyed.”

“Exactly,” Max flares his wings out, “With Beef he got some negative energy but the rest of you have been able to withstand him.”

Swallowing Joe pokes his fangs out and frowns, “I thought something like that.”

“I know what Avar is going to do next and it’s not nice. I can make it so you won't have to deal with it.”

“Oh… Uh, what is he planning?”

Max flicks his tail, “He would make it so you can’t be around running or flowing water. No flying over rivers or walking over bridges. Both would hurt and coming in contact with the water would burn you.”

Frowning Joe licks his lips, “how would you fix this?”

Reaching into his bag Max pulls a small drop-shaped ruby, “Back when I was with Menko, vampires would use these to be more human-like when in towns and such. Now it only has enough power to stop water from hurting you.”

Carefully reaching forwards Joe picks the small gemstone up, “Thank you, do you know what else is going to happen?”

Chittering softly Max shrugs, “I don’t know, anything is possible,” With that Max disappears in a puff of smoke.

Joe rolls his eyes at the small dragon’s theatrics. Slipping the gem into his pocket he walks over to the dog park. 

The dogs still need to be fed. As he nears the log he spots a familiar pair of cat-like ears.

“Howdy Cub,” Joe grins, flashing his fangs.

Cub smiles back. He's clearly exhausted, “ Hey Joe.”

“How are you doing?” Joe asks as he sits beside the pharaoh. 

“I should be asking you that,” Cub shakes his head, “But, I'm ok. The vex are just trying to contain what he’s doing so less magic is keeping me human.”

Joe nods, “Well, I'm glad you took up my offer to hang around at the dog park.” 

Cub laughs, “It’s a lot safer than my base.”

Rolling his eyes Joe nods, “If you need anything, you can come up to the winery.”

As Cub stands up he yawns, Joe smiles and goes about taking care of the dogs. On his way out he spots a small lion sleeping in the shade.

Hours later Cub wakes up. His tail twitches as he rolls into the sun. It’s nice and warm, slowly waking up fully he looks around. 

There’s a small pile of cat toys and blankets neatly piled nearby. Yawning widely he stands up and pads over to the blankets. Flopping down on a blanket he finds a rubber ball. After a moment of sniffing, he recognizes that it probably belongs to Ren.

Pushing it away he continues to sniff around. The dogs were all over by the water playing around. Sitting back on his haunches, Cub flicks his ears content to watch the dogs play around until the vex could return to help him be human again.

A few hours later Joe comes around to check on the dogs. When he spots Cub he waves and walks over.

Cub stands up alarmed. Joe’s face is a lot more red than normal, and it’s spreading. Nudging the vampire into the shade Cub growls at him.

“Cub are you ok what’s up?” Joe asks concern for his friend setting in.

Pawing up at Joe’s leg Cub convinces him to lean down. Once he’s at a level where Cub can reach, he gently bumps his face with his paw.

“Something is one my face?”

At Cub’s nod, he pulls his communicator out and looks at his sunburned face, “Oh, uh that’s a problem,” At Cub’s annoyed expression he rolls his eyes, “I’ll ask X to turn it to night so we can go to the winery.”

JoeHillsays: Uh, it appears I can’t go into the sun. 

Xisuma: Do you need me to change the time?

JoeHillsays: yes if it’s not going to mess with anyone 

DocM77: I'm fine and Bdubs is asleep so he probably won’t care.

As the others send in different replies saying it’s fine to change the time. 

The world quickly turns dark as the day is speed through. As soon as it’s night most of the redness fades. A small patch across his nose is left but after a quick drink from a water cup, it fades away.

Cub sniffs at it for a moment before realizing that its blood. 

“Come on,” Joe becocons as he walks back to his base. Cub follows softly behind him. 

Since it’s way too dark for a human to see Cub chuffs to warn him if he's about to step on something. After a few minutes, he starts to notice that Joe’s not actually tripping. When he looks up he jumps back slightly.

Joe’s eyes are glowing blood red. Swallowing Cub bumps his head against Joe’s leg. 

Looking down he gasps, “Well, I’m going to assume night vision.”

Cub nods and they walk in silence for a few minutes. Since Cub still has trouble with walking upstairs he lets Joe pick him up and set him inside. The winery is cozy and a lot warmer than the outside. As Cub flops down next to the fireplace, Joe gives a toothy yawn.

“I’m going to sleep, if you need anything I’ll be over here.”

Cub nods and starts to fall asleep as well. By the morning he’s back to being mostly human. His ears twitch softly as he stands up. Walking over to the kitchen table he sends Joe a quick message thanking him for his help and starts to head back to his base.

It’s days until anyone hears anything from Joe. He’s not on his communicator much so no one pays much mind until Cleo finds him.

He had passed out on his couch and was really pale. After a moment of panic, Cleo gives him some blood, the effect is instant.

He sits up and yawns, “Howdy Cleo.”

She turns around and nearly smacks him, “What happened?”

“I’m not sure, I just passed out?”

“You need to drink blood, you can’t just forget about it. Joe that was really dangerous.”

Frowning Joe sits down and lets his Fango poke out slightly, “I’m sorry I keep forgetting and just grabbing normal food.”

Cleo’s face softens, “I get it. I’ll remind you every so often.”

Joe laughs for a moment and sneezes softly. His form seems to flicker slightly. A moment later a small brown bat is left in his place.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I hope you have enjoy reading and have a happy New Years!!!


	3. Feign Death

“I would not wander so close to the edge young one,” A soft voice echoes.

Shaking his head Impulse sits against the cool bedrock, “I’m hearing things again,” He mumbles to himself.

“I am not just some voice, I don’t think you are ready to know what I truly am.”

“Ok, I’ve officially lost my mind,” Impulse grumbles.

The voice laughs softy, “Sweet child, you are not insane. I am the void. I shall not say more than that.”

Impulse backs away from the hole and towards the ladder a feeling of safety washes over him.

“Please don’t leave. I would like to talk.”

Stopping Impulse turns around slowly, “Okay.”

“Thank you, after you became infused with void I was able to speak with you. You just thought that I was the sound the void makes. Which in a way is true,” The more Void talks the less threatening and more peaceful it sounds, “Tell me young one what happened to infuse you and void.”

“Uh, there’s a meteor that’s been turning my friends and I into different things. He won’t let us leave so we just have to make do…”

“That fiend. If only she were still here…”

“When you said I was infused with void what do you mean?”

After a moment the Void answers, “I am the void, bedrock is the barrier between me and my siblings. You may have bedrock patches but your eyes and blood are void. You are one of my Voidlings.”

A warm feeling takes hold and Impulse nods softly, “Oh, uh is it bad to have holes in the bedrock?”

The void laughs for a moment, “No child, a very long time ago I would have swallowed the world. Now I am no longer in charge or such things.”

Nodding sagely Impulse looks at his hands. The bedrock patches seem to reflect the void.

“I will protect you from wandering too close to the edge but when you are ready and step off. I will be here to welcome and great you,” With that the void falls silent and Impulse is left frozen looking into the starry void glittering below.

…...

Joe squeaks in pure terror as he’s suddenly falling. Thankfully Cloe had the common sense to catch him. She gently sets him down on the end table and shoots Xisuma a message.

“Ok, X will be here in a few minutes,” Cleo says as she inspects the tiny bat.

He’s light brown and is about the size of her palm. Despite the fact that he had fallen and is still in shock from turning into a bat he looks relatively ok. He wiggles around on the table attempting to sit up.

“Joe,” Cleo says softly to get his attention, “You're an evening bat.”

Joe squeaks quietly before inspecting his wings. 

The room is deathly silent as Xisuma walks in. Cleo points him over to where Joe is sitting.

“So, shapeshifting…” Xisuma grins softly under his mask, “That’ll be fun once you get used to it, won’t it?”

The bat softly nods his head and squeaks.

“Do you think you’ll be able to shift into other animals,” Xisuma asks as he lets Joe pull himself up onto his hand.

Joe shrugs, as Cleo hands Xisuma the vampire book, “So far he’s been following the vampires from this. It says they can turn into snakes and wolves along with being bats.”

Xisuma winces, “Scar won’t like that.”

Clicking her tongue Cleo nods, “Yeah, but Ren will be happy to have a wolf friend.”

Squeaking Joe shudders as he rolls off of Xisuma’s hand as his form melts into a large gray snake. 

Xisuma yelps in surprise, as Joe slithers around a lamp post, “Cleo how long did it take for him to turn into a bat then snake?”

“Uh, like ten minutes, I think.

Cleo pulls her communicator out and gets a picture of the snake. She and Xisuma spend the next few minutes trying to figure out what kind of snake Joe is.

“He looks like a Gray Ratsnake,” Xisuma murmurs as he carefully moves Joe off the lamp. He sets him down in the middle of the floor and watches as he starts slithering around. He looks to be about the length of a five year old. As he moves around he starts getting the hang of slithering.

A few minutes later the snake form is replaced with a small reddish brown wolf. After determining that he’s a red wolf Joe stands up and starts padding around the house. 

When he turns back to human he makes a face, “That was horrible.”

“Didn’t like shapeshifting that frequently?” Xisuma grins from under his mask.

Joe nods, “I don’t think shapeshifting is supposed to be all back and forth.” 

Xisuma nods, his tail flicking softly, “I wouldn’t imagine so.”

Taking a seat Joe inspects his fangs, “Uh, do my fangs look sharper?”

Pausing for a moment Xisuma inspects the sharp teeth, “I think so.”

After a second Cleo chimes in, “You’re probably not supposed to purely drink from cups. Your fangs need to be dulled down as you bite.”

“Oh, Well that’s a problem,” Joe mutters, “i need to drain animals… that makes a huge mess.”

Xisuma laughs, “Well, Doc can probably help with that. I think he has like silicone dog toys or something that he uses to keep his fangs dull.”

“That could work,” Joe murmurs, “My fangs are supposed to be able to rip flesh from bone and drain blood.”

As the conversation winds down it shifts to eating with fangs in general. As a general consensus it’s not easy.

“I keep biting my lip,” Joe grins.

Xisuma nods in sympathy and Cleo cackles, “Yeah, you just need to practice.”

Leaning back Joe gasps, “Please, I do my best.”

“I’m sure you do,” Cleo grins.

Joe shakes his head in mock offense, “I’ve gotten a lot better.”

“Well, if you practice eating with your fangs you can probably drain animals without making a mess,” Xisuma explains as he flicks his tail.

“You’re probably right,” Joe groans, “It’s just I don’t like killing them, what I do now they live and drinking from them kills them,”

Cleo nods softly, “You could probably find a way to not drain the animal.”

“It would take a lot of practice…” He trails off.

Xisuma’s spines flair slightly, “There’s a bit more to it than that isn’t there?”

Hesitantly Joe nods, “Drinking from the source is a bit too good, I want to keep drinking and the more blood I drink at once it’s like the blood lust increases more every time.”

With a soft sigh Xisuma shakes his head, “Avar is trying to make us fight isn’t he…”

Joe nods a bit sadly, “Yeah, he thrives on negative emotions and I think he’s trying to do something extreme so we turn away from someone.”

“If that bastard thinks we would ever do that he’s dead wrong,” Cleo glowers, Xisuma nods in agreement as his tail flops against the ground.

After a moment Joe picks at his nails a little, “Uh Xisuma, would it be possible to file my claws?”

The end drake looks over and inspects the claws for a moment, “You don't need them?”

“Nope, they probably would have been used to help restrain prey and well, that's not the problem.”

“You should be good to cut them if you want to,” Xisuma nods.

Joe grins softly, “Ok, thanks.”

Xisuma chuffs slightly, “Doc says the meteor has been talking about a gift… i don't know what he means by that but something else might happen. Avar has been calling you little bard.”

Joe winces softly, “I don’t like that…”

“I don't like it either,” Xisuma mutters his spines brissaling.

Cleo stands up, “Joe, which hermits have you drunk from?”

“Uh i had a little bit of Stress’s blood and i think that's it. I try to avoid drinking player blood.”

“Is the blood weird tasting?”

Joe shakes his head, “It’s more addictive… it tasted way too good so I don’t think it would be overly safe if I drank it.” 

Xisuma nods, “I’m glad you’re taking the safety of others into account.”

“Avar is trying to make me a reason to argue, I’m doing my best to avoid that,” Joe yawns, “Sorry I guess I'm a bit sleepy.”

Chuffing softly Xisuma nods, “I would expect this all to be very tiring. Send me a messing when you wake up.”

Standing up, Cleo pushes him towards his bed room, “Go to sleep, your brain needs a break.”

Joe nods and walks back to his room. After he’s in pajamas he lays down in his coffin and is out in a matter of seconds. As the day goes by Joe is soundly asleep and the other hermits go about their days. 

At one point Xisuma finds the vampire book and flips through it a bit. He finds a small subsection in the coffin chapter about roses. As he reads he realises that could potentially be a hazard. If someone puts a rose on his coffin when he’s in it he would be forced into sleep and wouldn't wake up until it's removed. Making a note of this Xisuma warns the chat.

While Joe sleeps Cleo starts making sunlight resistance potions. She knows that Joe will protest the potions saying he can make them himself… it's safer for everyone on the server if Cleo supplies him with the potions. Bdubs has learned how to make them but Joe can’t be trusted with a brewing stand. Cleo puts an umbrella in with the potions. 

It will work perfectly for if he’s heading to his underground cave or feeding the dogs.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> sorry if it's not as good as normal.


	4. Vampiric Touch

“So, how are you doing?” Xisuma asks.

“Much better than I thought,” Joe responds, “I think I’ve found a good balance of blood and normal foods.”

“That’s good,” Xisuma nods, “And any problems with anything else?” 

“Not really, I’ve found a good mix of working at night and day works.”

Flicking his tail Xisuma grins, “So, any magic bits yet?”

“Nope, Max thinks I need to wait and see if I generate my own magic like you do or if I have to rely on other sources.”

“Smart,” Xisuma shrugs, “I thought it would be smart to warn you, Cleo and Zedaph have been planning to give you a bunch of vampire stuff.”

Rolling his eyes Joe laughs, “Well I’m willing to try something different.”

“Don’t let them hear that you’ll never be allowed to dress normal again.”

Joe grins as he waves Xisuma out the door, “Thanks for the heads up.”

Once Xisuma is gone Joe walks into the kitchen, he’s got some interesting ideas. Pulling out a box of unflavored gelatin he mixes up a batch, replacing the water with blood. The result is pretty good and he starts to make another batch, this time with small strawberry shaped molds.

Once everything has set Joe grins, happy with his creation. It’s a lot less awkward to eat a small gummy candy looking thing in front of others than drinking a cup of blood.

He’s scared quite a few hermits like that already. He was drinking some during a meeting and it was clearly making the others uncomfortable.

Over the last few days he’s gotten pretty good at shapeshifting. He’s discovered that the wolf form can withstand the sun. 

Ren had shown up on the full moon and helped him learn to be a wolf. 

Barking loudly outside of Joe’s door Ren bounces around waiting.

When the vampire opens the door Ren jumps up and nudges him with his nose.

“Hey Ren, let me guess you want me to shift as well.”

Nodding Ren barks and paces.

A small pop of mist later Joe is replaced with a smaller reddish wolf. Ren pads around and sniffs him. 

Ren takes off into the night with Joe close on his heels. They end up in Bdubs’ village. Finding the phantom passes out in a flower bed Ren lays down next to him as Joe plops down on the road.

As Bdubs wakes up he frowns, “Please don’t tell Xisuma I fall asleep like that. He’ll make something that teleports me when I fall asleep.”

Both wolves give him a look.

Bdubs flaps his wings out, “I know it is a bad habit and I’ll get creepers but sometimes I can’t bring myself to move.”

Joe pushes his head under Bdubs hand and lets him pet his ears.

Bdubs turns to Ren and asks, “Do you want me to brush your fur?”

Ren barks happily as Joe looks up at the phantom.

“Don’t worry I can brush you too,” Bdubs giggles softly as he pulls out a dog brush and soon he has a large pile of fur.

When Ren is done he nudges Joe into place and Bdubs gently starts brushing his fur.

He charters away as he brushes his fur and by the end there are a pair of well groomed wolves and Bdubs gets back to his gardening.

Joe makes a note in the calendar to hang out with Ren on the full moons.

As he shuffles around his base he trips over something blocking the hallway. Umbrellas. It appears that the one Cleo brought over had multiplied…

Picking up each of the umbrellas Joe laughs, each one was a different color and had different patterns. Some are undeniably frilly parasols.

“Hello Joe,” Cleo walks out from behind a wall.

“Hi Cleo, to what do I owe for the pleasure of your visit?” Joe grins, slightly on guard. 

“So, you’re a vampire,” Cleo grins.

“Let me guess, you want to see me dressed up as a vampire.”

“Yep,” She grins as she pulls him into the other room, “I borrowed these from Zedaph.”

Staring in partially stunned silence Joe looks up at Cleo, “Why does he have so many costumes?”

“I think he keeps every costume that a hermit wears… it's a bit weird.”

“It is not, it’s recycling,” the sheep calls from a different room.

“When did you people get here?” Joe asks, mildly concerned.

Cleo grins, “We get here like ten minutes ago, Zedaph’s here to make sure you don’t break anything.”

“I’m not getting out of this am I?”

“Nope,” Cleo piles a bunch of clothes into his arms and grins devilishly.

Poking out his fangs slightly Joe looks amused, “Ok… I’ll try this on.”

Joe disappears into his bedroom and changes onto the outfit Cleo made.

“You’re lucky I didn’t let Zedaph dress you up like Strahd.”

“Well, lucky me then,” Joe calls back, “Cleo, is this a corset?”

“Yeah, don’t over lace it,” She calls back, “you don’t need to breathe but still.”

“Why?”

“Victorian style vampires,” Cleo giggles in explanation.

When Joe is fully dressed he walks out to show Cleo and Zedaph.

Both of them grin as Joe spins around.

“Now you look like a vampire,” Zedaph laughs. 

Joe’s wearing a pair of black dress pants, a black button down shirt with a red cravat. Small Silver buttons and jewelry adorn a dark red vest. A cloak placed on top. His shoes are black with dark red accents, and to top it all off, they place an inky black top hat with a band matching the cravat. 

“As much as I love the aesthetic. It’s a bit much,” Joe murmurs as he looks at a Picture Cleo took. His reflection had started to fade from the mirrors so pictures work better.

Cleo hums in agreement, “Yeah, something a bit more subtle than this.” 

Something like this?” Zeadph asks as he pops up holding a second bundle of clothing. 

When Joe returns from putting the clothes on, Cloe grins, “That looks like you.”

Joe smiles softly. He’s been given simple black clothing with red accents. Over top he has a soft flowy overcoat and a sun hat, “This is nice.”  
  


Zedaph grins, “I know fashion,” He pulls a pair of sunglasses out and plops them onto Joe’s face, “There, perfect.”

Smiling softly Joe flashes his fangs, they continue taking for a while before the others head to their homes.

Sighing Joe frowns as he looks into the mirror. His reflection has almost fully disappeared. It’s almost like the opacity is being lowered, “Joepacity,” He mutters to himself. 

Chuckling at the pun he flops down on his couch and picks up one of his books. Unbeknownst to him chaos in unfolding in a different part of the server

…….

Impulse grins sleepily up at Tango, “So, why?”

“Well… I found a bat and it would be fun to prank Joe.”

“And why did you push me onto the floor?”

“You wouldn’t wake up,” Tango grins, “I had to.”

“You couldn’t have gotten Zedaph for this?”

“I could have, but he’s been cleaning his storage out.”

Impulse rolls his eyes and stands up, “What are you doing with the bat?”

“I’m going to name it Not-Joe,” Tango grins.

“Ok, I’m going to go back to sleep,” Impulse frowns, as he face plants back onto his bed.

Tango shrugs and snags a name tag from Impulse’s chests. As he spreads his wings to take off he hears a soft rusle from behind him. In a wall.

Walking forwards he pulls a picaxe out from his communicator, “Hello?”

Hearing no response Tango carefully breaks the wall open and finds, “Grian?”

“Don’t tell Impulse,” The startled parrot pleads.

“Ok, I’ll stay quiet but you have to stop by my base tomorrow.”

“Deal.”

Tango replaces the wall and takes off. Landing outside Joe’s base the bat he’s holding makes a soft squeaking noise. Shushing it Tango gently places the name tag on the bat and sets it inside Joe’s base.

  
  


Opening his wings Tango darts back to his base and waits for his communicator to buzz. 

…….

Joe’s puttering around in his kitchen when a noise draws his attention. Walking out into the main room he spots a large brown bat clinging onto the ceiling, “Oh.”

JoeHillsSays: very funny guys,

JoeHillsSays: thanks for the bat

Bdubs: what happened with a bat?

JoeHillsSays: someone put a bat named not Joe into my base.

Xisuma: oh my god I thought you meant someone hit you with a bat!

Grian: wasn’t me

TangoTek: are you sure?

JoeHillsSays: 'm making him a little bat box now thanks for the pet

Tango Tek: you’re welcome

Joe laughs softly and places his communicator on the countertop, as he picks up the small bat he smiles.

Taking it outside the cool night air washes against his skin as he sets up a box for the bat. 

As he completes the small box he places the bat nearby and walks back inside his house. Getting back to sorting out his chests he finds some flowers that he found. As he starts sorting the chest his hand brushes past a small purple blossom. 

The effect isn’t immediate and he keeps sorting his chests out. He sneezes a few times chalking it up to the dust. Then his hands start itching. 

Looking closely the skin is starting to get blotchy. Joe walks over to a sink and washes his hands. Deciding that this might have something to do with the meteor he pulls his communicator out and shoots Xisuma a message.

After a moment the admin runs into the winery, “So what’s happening?”

Showing the admin his hands Joe frowns, “I had a reaction to something, I’m not really sure what.”

Xisuma frowns as he paces softly, “This could be natural right? The meteor might not be involved?”

“Well, yeah, I just don’t remember touching anything that would trigger this.”

Flicking his tail around himself Xisuma thinks, “Uh what were you doing?”

“I was sorting through my chests,” Joe answers scratching idly at the puffy skin.

“Wait… do you have alliums?”

“I think so, why?”

“Stress mentioned something the other day, alliums are garlic blossoms.”

“Ohh, yeah, that would probably do this. I’ve got a flower chest,” Joe points Xisuma over to the chest and watches as he pulls the purple flowers out.

As Xisuma walks past Joe sneezes, “Well, I think we know it’s the Alliums.”

“Yeah,” Hoe walks a few steps behind as Xisuma chucks the flowers into a composter.

“Let me know if you have any more problems.”

“Will do thanks for the help.”

“Any time my friend, I am glad to help.”

As Xisuma flies off Joe yawns and flops down onto one of the spare beds. The coffin was, ok but right now he just needs a little normalcy.

Drifting off to sleep Joe hears a small flutter of wings behind him. The small white dragon lands softly beside him, sets something down and flaps off into the rising sun.

Joe sleeps well into the day and wakes up right after most of the hermits eat lunch. Yawning he blinks and grabs the small book that Max had left. 

Flipping through the book he realizes just what it is, it’s a spell book. A small note was it’s crawled on a small slip of paper, it reads. After poking around a bit I’ve found you’ll be able to use the four spells in this book- Max, PS, Hypno wrote this.

Smiling at the note Joe reads each of the spells and nods. Each one was familiar and they weren’t too difficult to learn. 

The four spells are Mending, Mage hand, Speak With Animals, and Enthrall. 

After retrieving the bat, Joe sits down and attempts to talk. After a few tries the bat looks up at him and chitters back, and Joe understands.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> And that's a wrap folks, Cleo is up next so tell me what you want to see.
> 
> There will be a gap between this chapter and the next. It will come out a week after normal so expect it on the 29th. School is kicking my butt so a small break from the main project is needed. <3

**Author's Note:**

> Merry Christmas! And Happy holidays.


End file.
